Whether your business has decided to go online or you plan on starting your own ecommerce website, there’s a very important concept that will aid in either your success or failure: online conversion.

Now, what is online conversion? Online conversion is the percentage of the amount of visitors to your site who end up making a purchase. For example, if you had 15 unique visitors to your site in one hour and 3 sales during that time, your online conversion rate would be 20%.

Keep in mind that this is just an example—a twenty percent online conversion rate is practically unheard-of! A normal conversation rate goal for online stores is around 2-3%.

With poor conversion rates, your website will not be as producing the type of income that you are looking for. Here are some tips on how to determine and increase your online conversation rates by optimizing certain aspects of your website:

1. First, Know Your Online Conversion Rate:

Determine the amount of visitors you get on your site in a given period of time. If your web-hosting agent does not provide a tool like this, you can use Google Analytics or another web-analytic tool.

Add up the number of visitors you’ve had for one month.

Example:

Week 1: 48

Week 2: 90

Week 3: 86

Week 4: 107

TOTAL: 331

Add up your total number of sales for that month.

Example:

Total Sales: 4

Divide the number of SALES by the number of VISITORS.

Example:

4 (sales) / 331 (visitors) = .012

Determine your percentage by moving the decimal places two places to the right.

Example: .012 to 1.2%

Keep in mind that the industry average is 2-3% for online stores. This rate may seem low, but online retailers receive much more traffic than retail shops do, which drops their conversion rate.

2. Improve Online Conversion Rate by Increasing Site Quality:

One of the first things you can do is increase the site quality. Do this by:

A. Maintaining a fast website—don’t make customers wait and wait for pages to load.

B. Removing clutter—the only things on the landing page should be a welcome, a few featured products, and then links to other pages (Shopping Cart, Clearance, Store Categories, etc.). You may put one, maybe two ads for a sale.

C. Clarity for Orders—the shopping cart, shipping information, and return policies of your business should be clearly visible to your visitors. Make purchasing from your site as easy and convenient as possible.

D. Consistent Updates—if visitors come by after a month and the page is still the same, that sends a message that the business is not necessarily on top of things. Update your page two to three times a week with different featured items, sales, etc.

E. Site Credibility—let consumers know this is a real business by providing an address/location, phone number, and even photographs of the store or key executives to put your site visitors at ease.

Now that we’ve discussed the many aspects that affect online conversion rate, start implementing a few of these tips into your online business to see results! The only mistake you can make with this project is to do nothing or to expect too much, too soon. By keeping your expectations in check, you can avoid unnecessary disappointment and delays in your success and begin increasing your online conversion.